VGS Restoration Shop 🛠️

[Tanooki | 4,930]

This was an effort that went down last night.  Ultimately, I got it down by the third one where I could knock it out in about an hour.  The first one I went slowest on (atomic purple) as that's mine to keep, a replacement upgrade for my grape with a TFT in it I'm putting up for sale with the other two.

All across the board IPS v2 panels, and they have the 8 colors and 8 brightness choices to them.  Only re-used the original boards, speakers, and contact pads, rest of those re-shells is all new.  All 3 got glass lenses.  One of the reshells, dead speaker but I keep spare parts thankfully.  Added a 4th image, you can see the difference in TFT vs IPS.  I had to put the IPS to its lowest setting since it was blowing out the image on the camera otherwise.

[bowser | 598]

I wanted to share some restorations that I did recently. These are restored more in terms of functionality rather than physical outlook.

1) I got this Pokemon Red that had an issue displaying some of the sprites. They just show up as weird boxes instead of the actual image. Pics from seller because I forgot to take my own before fixing it.

I searched around on Google and most people said the SRAM needed to be replaced. I didn't want to do that and decided to try fixing it myself. I noticed the game wasn't saving even though the save battery was still good at a solid 3v. That was my first clue. I figured maybe the SRAM chip wasn't getting any voltage from the battery because of a corroded trace somewhere. I got out my known good Pokemon Red and measured the voltage on all the pins of the SRAM. I found 3 pins that were getting power from the battery. I checked the same pins on this one and found 1 pin that was dead. The pin went to a via that was corroded on the underside of the board. I traced the connection and found it was connected to the MBC3 chip so I just added a jumper wire over the connection and everything started working perfectly! The graphics were back and the game started saving too.

Here is a pic of the board after adding the jumper. The previous owner attempted to fix this board unsuccessfully I guess because all the chips appeared to be sloppily reflowed and one of the chips is even crooked. The solder work on the battery was also messy and I fixed that to be nice and smooth.

 

2) Another Pokemon Red where the previous owner for some reason stuck a screwdriver through the clam shell near the pins in an attempt to open the cartridge. They bent several pins of the ROM chip and snapped 1 pin off entirely. There was just the tiniest nub left attached to the chip.

This pin was connected to one of the gold connector pins but there was barely any metal left to make contact with a jumper wire. Every time I soldered a jumper to the tiny nub it would pop off easily as soon as I touched it. I had to come up with another solution. I ended up soldering a vertical copper wire to the pin and immediately added some hot glue to prevent it from moving. Then I was able to bend the wire and solder it to the appropriate gold pin.

It looks messy but it did the job and started working again!

 

3) Dragon Warrior III on GBC that just wouldn't boot up no matter what. It always came up with the garbled Nintendo logo and on the rare occasion that it worked it would display a message that the game wasn't compatible with the original Gameboy. And I was trying the game out on a GBA so it was very very weird it would show that message. I tried fixing this game several times over the past year and always failed. I reflowed all the chips and cleaned the pins and nothing worked. The board looked pretty clean too. Recently I was looking at it again under a magnifying glass and I noticed one via near the MBC chip at the top was partially corroded. I took out my multimeter and noticed the pin on the MBC was not making a connection to where it was supposed to go. So I stuck a tiny piece of copper wire through the via and soldered it down and the game finally started working!

 

4) I fixed this Snoopy Game & Watch tabletop for a friend. It was in great condition except for the battery compartment. The previous owner had left the batteries in for years and they leaked and destroyed the contacts completely. I cleaned 2 of the contacts but the 3rd was disintegrated so I hand made a new one out of a thin brass sheet. I cut out the template with my dremel and bent it into shape. It worked great!

Before:

Old vs new contacts:

After:

 

5) And finally my latest repair that I'm really proud of. I solder fixed my virtual boy and was successful on my first try! Mainly because I got a lot of great pointers and what to watch out for from this amazing YouTube video:

Here are the pics from disassembling the virtual boy and the fix:

Disassembly:

One of the displays:

Solder fixing the display:

After cleaning the mess and putting it back in:

I did a better job on the other side after gaining experience from the first one:

It was pretty nerve-wracking attempting this fix because the ribbons are so delicate and there is no room for error. After this I fixed 2 more Virtual Boys!

Edited February 26, 2021 by bowser

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

So I’ve been looking for the best way to remove stickers from labels. I’ve tried everything on the Mega Turrican attached and got the best results from Bestine. I eventually stopped working on it because I got to aggressive with the spudger and tore the label a bit. But you can see the progress that was made. 

[Aguy | 771]

@bowser Pokemon Missingno version?

[MiamiSlice | 3,089]

Here's something a little different. Some of you might already know I picked up this Nintendo employee jacket: 

Unfortunately this thing had seen a lot of use. It was like this almost all over: 

I had always figured when fabric is pilly like that there is no fixing it. But I talked to my mom and she encouraged me to try the disposable razor technique. So this afternoon I had some phone meetings that wouldn't be too taxing and I sat down with the jacket draped over my knee, disposable razor in one hand and lint roller in the other, and went shave-shave-shave all over. Here's an in-progress shot: 

And a couple hours later, this is how it looked:  

This really works! Here's another before and after of the collar area:

Spoiler

I wrapped it up with a wash on delicate cycle and drying it inside out. Here's me in my not-worn-looking employee jacket: 

And my wife is glad I'm willing to wear this instead of just hiding it in a closet

[MiamiSlice | 3,089]

You know what it's gonna be. 

Got this Pokemon SoulSilver big box without the game cart, Pokewalker or Pokewalker tray for a steal, $90 for this and the pre-order bonus figure also in box, but the box had some bad stuff going on. 

On the back, a lot of adhesive residue on one side, which had picked up a ton of hair and dirt over the years. I'm putting this behind a spoiler tag because it's not for the faint of heart, I am warning you if you throw up after seeing this I am not responsible for it!!! 

Spoiler

I had to use a LOT of Bestine and q-tips to get it all off, but I did: 

Second, the top of the box had a big price sticker that was at one point attempted to be removed a bit and whoever attempted gave up on it, and over time the sticker dried out and got really stuck on: 

Here's an in-progress pic, drenching it in Bestine, trying to pull it off, repeat and repeat: 

And here's the final result after scrubbing all the remains of the sticker and adhesive residue off: 

Anyway, after all that effort I managed to sell the box and inserts for $149.99 on eBay, so I got the pre-order figure and some pocket change in the end. 

[drxandy | 3,225]

Battery swap!

Had a sixaxis with a dead battery, found a replacement a while back while thrifting. Pretty easy to change.

It's my first time taking apart a ps3 controller, just never took the plunge. I mistook which controller needed the battery and I cracked open a dualshock as well. I thought it was cool to see the revisions in design between the two, and took the opportunity to clean but didn't snap more pics. 

The stock sixaxis battery says 610mAh, the replacement I have is 1800mAh for a dualshock so bring on the battery life.. maybe haha. Thought it was neat that the 610mAh had a sled to fit and a bigger battery still fits perfectly.

Worst design of the sixaxis: little piece between the l and r 1 and 2 buttons that has to be seated just right on both sides.. oof

Battery charging now and looks good!

Edited April 25, 2021 by drxandy

[drxandy | 3,225]

Reshelled a beat 360 controller

Before:

 

After:

[RH | 4,895]

I got a really, really dirty GameCube from a local thrift shop about 3 years ago.  It's been sitting on my shelf ever since, here's a couple before and after shots. Full Imgur gallery here.

BEFORE

 

AFTER

[drxandy | 3,225]

Bag/case cleanin!

I picked up an Xbox folder style case and it was gross, my original disc bag had also become gross over the years.. time to make em look fresh.

Before:

 

After:

This only took a little time, I saw a few spots I missed and did a little detail on em.

My technique is, toothbrush + diluted laundry soap water, pat dry with paper towel, repeat with clean water and toothbrush and pat down again.

Only need a tiny bit of soap, just to break the gunk down.

This gba bag had the normal usage grossness and was colored up with silver sharpie on the logo as well as around the blurple trim.. should have done a full before picture but I used 70% iso with qtips to remove it then went to town with the toothbrush.

Cleaned up! I love this particular style bag so my main gba is going in it. 

This isn't that tough of a thing to do or anything, just figured I would show what can be done with just a little love and the results are a world of difference.

[MiamiSlice | 3,089]

I have the same technique!

[drxandy | 3,225]

Weekend project!

I have been wanting to sleeve a controller cable with paracord for a while and with the last lot of controllers I had the perfect opportunity for a snes cord.

The person who repaired this cord before had individually wrapped each cord with electrical tape and it was kinda annoying to undo each one.

I wanted to keep them as long as possible, but next time I would just clip either end and start from scratch because it was a mess.

After the cable was separated, time to remove the plug.

First time removing the housing, made a device from a paperclip one on each side of the plug and leverage to pop out of the housing, then remove the cable leads out of the top housing.

The cable was then stripped of the outer rubber.

Here's more than halfway there. I then staggered the pins into electrical tape to use as a guide to thread through the Paracord.

Stripped the wires, soldered them together and electrical taped each, next time I'm gonna have to pick up some heat shrink in the right size because the tape wasn't the easiest to slide through the Paracord and the heat shrink I picked up was too big.

Decided to paint the outer plug housing, but not the part that slides in and out of the console.

Since everything is pretty much done I cleaned up the controller I chose to add the cable to and added some white buttons I got forever ago from kitsch bent. I kinda liked the look for this discolored shell with this camo paracord.

Just have to wait for that housing to dry before I can get er up and running but I'm super happy with how it turned out, the paracord hides the repair very nicely. 

I'll report back with the final shot in a week or two.

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

@bowser @Nes Freak where are you buying your replacement save batteries from for NES? Anyone really

Quote me so I know you replied!

Edited May 19, 2021 by a3quit4s

[Nes Freak | 584]

10 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

@bowser @Nes Freak where are you buying your replacement save batteries from for NES? Anyone really

Quote me so I know you replied!

i buy Duracell  and a battery holder for my nes games

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

31 minutes ago, Nes Freak said:

i buy Duracell  and a battery holder for my nes games

Where do you get the holder from - link?

[Nes Freak | 584]

14 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

Where do you get the holder from - link?

https://www.amazon.com/uxcell®-Plastic-Housing-CR2032-Battery/dp/B074T3FV73

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

6 minutes ago, Nes Freak said:

https://www.amazon.com/uxcell®-Plastic-Housing-CR2032-Battery/dp/B074T3FV73

Got it - you don't trust the ones that have solder tabs preinstalled ala https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B07PT6ZZXT/ref=ox_sc_act_image_1?smid=A6KUS834LWLTQ&psc=1 or are you just trying to make the next battery change easier?

[Nes Freak | 584]

2 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

Got it - you don't trust the ones that have solder tabs preinstalled ala https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B07PT6ZZXT/ref=ox_sc_act_image_1?smid=A6KUS834LWLTQ&psc=1 or are you just trying to make the next battery change easier?

when possible i prefer to use a battery holder.

[bowser | 598]

4 hours ago, a3quit4s said:

@bowser @Nes Freak where are you buying your replacement save batteries from for NES? Anyone really

Quote me so I know you replied!

I got mine from Amazon I think. Sets of 10 comes out to about $1 each. But I think these cheapo batteries are draining pretty quick and I saw someone using Panasonic ones online so I'll try to get those next.

The battery holders are cool but they may or may not fit in all games. Plus if you drop the cart there's a chance the battery might pop out a little and you'll lose the save.

Edited May 20, 2021 by bowser

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

New reflow/solder station and helping hands. Excited!

[drxandy | 3,225]

Reassembled that snes controller. Happy to report: no issues, working great, and lookin' sharp!

[Hammerfestus | 3,823]

Can I Bestine a Blockbuster overlay off a PlayStation disc?

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

3 minutes ago, Hammerfestus said:

Can I Bestine a Blockbuster overlay off a PlayStation disc?

I use it on carts alot but I don't know if it would break down optical media. I certainly would not use it on the PCB itself so my vote would be no but maybe someone has done it with good results. 

[Hammerfestus | 3,823]

4 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

I use it on carts alot but I don't know if it would break down optical media. I certainly would not use it on the PCB itself so my vote would be no but maybe someone has done it with good results. 

That was my fear.  I guess I could always just dump some on Sammy Sosa or something and see what happens?

[a3quit4s | 4,093]

Just now, Hammerfestus said:

That was my fear.  I guess I could always just dump some on Sammy Sosa or something and see what happens?

I guess if you try it on the front on Sammy and then try and use ipa to clean it off, but I'd still be worried about the long term effect. Maybe wait for someone else to respond maybe they have tried it